Neorealism in the work of Gianni Rodari. Reflections 100 years after the birth of the author
From Firenze University Press Journal: Journal of History of Education (RSE)
Stefania Carioli, Università di Firenze
Gianni Rodari (1920–1980) is known and appreciated above all as an author of fantastical narratives, invented1 stories told to children «partly out of sympathy for them, partly out of a desire to play, stories with-out the least reference to reality or to good common sense» (Rodari 1993, 1), in which «reality erupts into the surrealistic exercise» (Rodari 1993, 7) to stimulate the children’s imagination as a means to understand reality from another point of view. However, in order to understand the complexity of the work of one of the greatest Italian children’s writers in the twentieth century (Zipes 1993), it is necessary to take into consideration the neorealist literary mode of his work, and in particular, Piccoli vagabondi (Small vagabonds) (1952–1953), a unicum in the work of this author (Allasia 2018), an «exceptional case» (Detti and Martinez 2002, 165), in which he inserted many traits of the impetuous democratic and popular movement of the immediate Second post-War period (Argilli 1982, 48), called “neorealism”.
In terms of literary mode this neorealistic novel is undoubtedly very far from the magic realism and surrealist techniques, which Rodari had constantly experimented with (Zipes 2014). We find this, for example, in a «bizarre fairy-tale novel» (Zipes 2014, 424), like There was twice Baron Lamberto, that is, the mysteries of the island of San Giulio (C’era due volte il barone Lamberto, ovvero, I misteri dell’isola di San Giulio) (1978). Just as it is far from the «art of making people laugh» (Detti and Martinez 2002) it is typical of Rodari. Piccoli vagabondi portrays the childhood discomfort of the postwar Reconstruction in Italy. It educates children to give a personal contribution to a collective life, which is according to the ideology of the communist party. For these reasons, the fantastic mode is completely excluded from it.
Moreover, the very fact that this novel has remained unique in the opera of Rodari testifies the choice to express his political and pedagogical commitment through the imagination and the invention of «every possible use of words», «not because everyone should be an artist but because no one should be a slave» (Rodari 1993, 4). Many reasons have meant that the novel Piccoli vagabondi has remained in the shadows more than any other of Rodari’s other works. These reasons were most likely also related to leftist ideology (which in Piccoli vagabondi shines in a particularly evident way, as con-firmed by the presence of ideological symbols, such as the crossed sickle and hammer) highlighted by Jack Zipes, in The Incomprehensible Gianni Rodari: Admittedly, Rodari is difficult to translate, and only a few of his books have been translated.
But I do not believe that the reluctance of American and British publishers to translate Rodari is entirely connected to the complexity of his works. It has more to do with his socialist ideology, his unique Italian humor, and his overt sentimentalism, which can be difficult to adapt and communicate, especially in the realm of children’s literature. Here, too, there is a problem because Rodari never wrote entirely for children; rather, he wrote on their behalf and constantly undermined the position and perspective of adults through silly nonsense and fervent political beliefs (Zipes 2014, 424).Therefore, there are many good reasons to analyze neorealism in the works of Gianni Rodari, 100 years after his birth. In addition to the importance of the novel Piccoli vagabondi as a historical source of the socio-political climate in which it was written, there are more pure pedagogical reasons. In fact, this neorealist novel was at the birth of the idea of Gramscian origin (Welton 1982).
It was of particular interest, according to which the education of children of subordinate classes had to be considered an essential element in a democratic society. In time, this process led Rodari from telling tragic stories that could have been real, to the awareness that, «generally speaking, we laugh too little in our schools» (Martinez 2002, 165) and that «the idea that educating the mind ought to be something gloomy is among the most difficult notions to combat» (Martinez 2002, 165).
DOI: https://doi.org/10.36253/rse-9399
Read Full Text: https://rivistadistoriadelleducazione.it/index.php/rse/article/view/9399
